


All is Fair

by humorless_hexagon



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Death, Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M, Trauma, Vietnam War, as in Klaus sees the dead, but just in case, klaus thinks about the war and its angsty, which... is pretty obvious
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-23
Updated: 2019-02-23
Packaged: 2019-11-04 03:48:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17890931
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/humorless_hexagon/pseuds/humorless_hexagon
Summary: Klaus doesn't hate the War as much as he should.





	All is Fair

Nights were hard in the A Shau Valley. Sometimes it was dead silent in a way that was too eerie to be comforting, like the “Crouching Beast” the mountain was named after would pounce any minute. Sometimes the jungle or the mortars screamed so loud they drowned out the voices of the dead. Sometimes the dead were louder.   


It was easier when Klaus didn’t know them. Nameless Vietnamese villagers from times long gone. People who wouldn’t have any idea that there was even a war going on. More often than not, though, they were soldiers. Kids from America fighting for “freedom” (whatever that even fucking meant) and the kids from North Vietnam fighting for their country. What would be left of it, anyway, after it was burnt to the ground.  
The soldiers were loud. Sobbing over their lives wasted humping through an unforgiving jungle just to get blown up by a land mine, or maybe even a freak accident. Yelling about how unfair it all was. Klaus didn’t need anyone to tell him that- he already knew.

He had arrived in the thick of it. He didn’t get to process or prepare. One moment he was being tortured, the next had escaped with a briefcase, then… there was a flash of light and a blur and he was in Vietnam. All he wanted was money for drugs. All he wanted was to be numb. It was fucking unfair.

But silver linings? Those were a thing weren’t they? Klaus wanted that to be true. He thought it was as soon as Dave had smiled that big sunflower grin at him and shown him how to hold a gun and throw a grenade (not that dear, old Dad hadn’t already taught him, but it was nice to pretend just to spend more time with Dave). Klaus never enjoyed wars, especially not the Vietnam War, but he found himself happy. He was  _ happy _ , no drugs needed.

Not all the time, at least. Sometimes the nights were hard and the dead were loud and Klaus would steal tranquilizers from the medic so he could mellow out. When Ben was around, the dead were a little bit more tolerable; they could reason through it or make jokes. But Ben wasn’t even born yet.  _ Klaus _ wasn’t even born yet-- the whole thing made his chest feel wobbly.

If it weren’t for Dave, Klaus would have felt entirely alone. Which, all things (dead and  _ loud  _ things) considered, was pretty ironic.

**Author's Note:**

> comments and kudos make my day! Thanks for reading :)


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